Youth in ____ face highest jobless rate

TEXT OF INTERVIEW

Steve Chiotakis: As we await that November jobs report from the Labor Department, this morning we tackle unemployment among the world’s young people. That’s the topic of this morning’s Marketplace Globalist Quiz, with the editor of TheGlobalist.com, Stephan Richter. Good morning.

Stephan Richter: Good morning, Steve. Ready for today’s Globalist quiz?

Chiotakis: I am. Let’s do it.

Richter: So here’s the question: Which of these countries faces the highest unemployment rate among its population that is below 25 years of age. Is it Germany? Is it Japan? Is it the United States or Spain where young people experience the highest level of unemployment right now?

Chiotakis: Hmm. I would say it’s got to be between the United States and Spain. I’m going to guess the United States.

Richter: Well, young Americans have a hard time right now, but your original guess was a bingo. You would have been right with Spain. Eurostat, which is the agency in Europe that looks at these numbers, has found that young Spaniards currently experience a 41.7 percent unemployment rate.

Chiotakis: Forty-one percent.

Richter: Yeah. A year ago? Well it was 26 percent, so that’s by the far the highest unemployment rate in the developed world.

Chiotakis: All right Stephan, what are the numbers for the United States?

Richter: Well if you look at the different ethnicities, young African Americans have an unemployment rate of 31.2 percent, Hispanics 21 percent, and young Asians and young whites are at an even level at around 16 percent. So quite high. But African Americans really face the steepest challenge right now.

Chiotakis: Here in the United States. All right. Stephan Richter, we appreciate you giving us that international perspective this morning.

Richter: Thanks for having me.

Chiotakis: Stephan Richter is publisher and editor-in-chief of TheGlobalist.com — the daily online magazine on the global economy, politics and culture.